Big data, which refers to the vast amounts of information collected from every imaginable source, is becoming an engine of job creation as businesses strive to harness and analyze that data in order to glean revenue-generating insights from it, according to Gartner.

Between now and 2015, the firm expects big data to create some 4.4 million IT jobs globally; of those, 1.9 million will be in the U.S. Applying an economic multiplier to that estimate, Gartner expects each new big-data-related IT job to create work for three more people outside the tech industry, for a total of almost 6 million more U.S. jobs.

But the estimate included this caveat: There's a serious shortage of IT professionals with big-data skills, and only one-third of those new jobs will be filled.

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